I was six years old when my parents told me that there was a small, dark jewel inside my skull, learning to be me.

I was six years old when my parents told me that there was a small, dark jewel inside my skull, learning to be me.

Mathematics catalogues everything that is not self-contradictory; within that vast inventory, physics is an island of structures rich enough to contain their own beholders.

For there is a truth which cannot be bought or sold, imposed by force, resisted or escaped.

Pop science goes flying off in all kinds of fashionable directions, and it often drags a lot of SF writers with it. I've been led astray like that myself at times.

Widespread caffeine use explains a lot about the twentieth century.

It was almost noon when the plane touched down at the Triad airport on the outskirts of Greensboro. There was a hire car waiting for me; I waved my notepad at the dashboard to transmit my profile, then waited as the seating and controls rearranged themselves slightly, piezoelectric actuators humming. As I started to reverse out of the parking bay, the stereo began a soothing improvisation, flashing up a deadpan title: Music for Leaving Airports 11 June 2008.